I took myself to the movies last night, and while I sat through the premovie commercials, the previews of coming attractions and the movie itself, I had a few throughts I wanted to share.

1) It still pisses me off no end to go to a theater, plunk down my $7.50 for a ticket ($15 for two, of course) -- and we won't even talk about the outrageous prices at the snack bar ($5.50 for a large popcorn? Gimme a break! $4 for a large soda? Can you spell G-O-U-G-E-D) -- and then have to sit through a batch of damned commercials! I pay them, they feed me commercials? I want one of those commercial zappers that they're selling late at night during the infomercial hours for the movie theater! I can almost -- almost -- forgive them for putting those Diet Coke commercials in there. At least they're selling Diet Coke at the concession stand. And they've always slipped in those corny cmmercials for the snack bar. But the Queasy Bake Oven? Where kids bake their own dog bones and dip them in things that resemble dripping blood and green ooze? Excuse me. This has gone too far. (Okay, those of you who are media aware will figure out that I went to see Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets).

2) Has Eddie Murphy finally broken his string of homages? We've had two Nutty Professors (borrowed from Jerry Lewis), two Dr. Doolittle's (from Rex Harrison, of course), I Spy (from Bill Cosby) and even Coming to America (ripped off from a story by, of all people, Washington Post columnist Art Buchwald). Now Eddie gives us Daddy Day Care. Since it seems to be a rip off from Mr. Mom (Michael Keaton) with a twist, I guess the answer may be -- no.

3) Look for Sir Ian McKellan to step into the Richard Harris role in the next Harry Potter movie. He already has the long white beard from the Lord of the Rings, and he can do that soft, reassuring voice that made Richard Harris so loveable to the kiddies. It's too bad that Richard Harris passed away, just as he was taking on such a loveable role that reaches so many kids. They need grandfatherly role models.

4) Watching the previews, I was reminded of something I caught during the Thanksgiving Day tv drought. I caught the Independand Film Channel's Dinner for Five marathon -- where John Favreau sits down at an LA restaurant with other actors to talk about film making. In the pilot, before Favreau learned a valuable lesson about not getting gassed at his own dinner party and sweating up a storm, they talked about a trend in modern moviemaking. They called it Five Movie Moments. What it is is this: The studio promotional department wants five movie moments they can pull out to make the trailer. They need five moments they can use to sell the movie. After seeing so many movies that were best told during the trailer, it seems to me that trailers is what Hollywood does best these days. Could you boil down Casablanca to five movie moments? How about Citizen Kane? No. And no. How about The Godfather? No. Great movies aren't made from five movie moments. Only great trailers are. Maybe that's why great movies come fewer and farther between these days. And why the best movies are done by independant film makers. And maybe they should take all those promotions people and lock them away in a little padded room and make them watch Dude, Where's My Car endlessly.

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